When all the trees
have been cut down, when all the animals have been hunted, when all the waters
are polluted, when all the air is unsafe to breathe, only then will you
discover you cannot eat money. ~
Cree Prophecy

I must start with the caveat that I am not an economist, nor
do I wish to be one; I have only a cursory knowledge of economics. Nonetheless,
anyone with a perfunctory knowledge of ecology or biology knows that the
continuous growth model on which our capitalist economy relies is completely
incompatible with life. Ecologists, environmentalists, and ecological
economists have been screaming this for decades. It takes nothing more than
common sense and observation with one's own senses to understand that we live
on a finite plant with finite resources which we depend on for life, and these
resources are being plundered at an ever-increasing rate. Yet, this simple
truth garners very little attention in the press where the environment is a
"second tier" issue. The only issue that merits attention in the context of almost
any discourse in the media is the economy.

The "health" of the economy is meaningless without healthy
ecological systems to support it.

When speaking about our manufactured economic "crisis," a
fraudulent hoax created by wholly lopsided wealth distribution rather than
actual scarcity, the right promotes putting more money in the hands of the
rich, the so-called job creators. This meme should be put to rest once and for all,
as it has been proven without a doubt that the accumulation of wealth by the
rich does not result in job growth, but in hoarding by the upper classes. The
left, on the other hand, feels that the government should be at the forefront
of job creation. In either case, the belief is more jobs equals better lives.
This is a myopic and dangerous assumption that will lead to the inevitable
obliteration of our species.

We are in an age of ecological crisis. Just about every
biological system on the planet is in decline. However, to combat this tragedy,
instead of reduce, reuse, and recycle, we delude, deny, and distract.

Nearly every job requires the expenditure of tremendous
amounts of energy. Now, if the energy came simply from manpower, then it would
be a non-issue. Regrettably, the energy is generally generated from environmentally
destructive fossil fuels or other renewable sources which may impart less harm,
but still have negative effects on geological systems and/or organisms. For
example, wind turbines are fatal to many birds and bats, and have been linked
to illnesses in humans. Solar panels require mining, sometimes for very rare
materials obtained via slave labor in Africa;
they require a great deal of energy to produce and maintain; and the materials
used and/or the by-products of production can be toxic. Of course, these are
merely two examples, but for every large-scale energy infrastructure, there are
great numbers of deleterious environmental effects. So, the more we work at
jobs, the more energy we use, the more harm to ecosystems.

As for jobs themselves, no matter what they are, they all
utilize materials and create waste. Moreover, many involve direct and/or
indirect forms of exploitation of the environment, animals, or other humans. So
the more jobs we have, the more harm to ecosystems.

We have enough basic goods to sustain every human on the
planet. New and used clothing items far exceed the number of people who need
them. (One need only see a Hollywood costume
warehouse to realize our glut of clothing.) Empty homes dot the landscape
across North America. Half of all food
produced is wasted. Potable water would likely not be an issue if it were not utilized
in and polluted by wasteful industrial processes (i.e., problems of overuse and
contamination). Granted, the unequal distribution of these basic necessities
renders them inaccessible to many humans on the planet, but that is a problem
of allocation, not supply.

Despite the optimism of technophiles, "green" jobs and
"green" products are more of a marketing ploy than a reality. Certainly, the
basic necessities of life (food, clothing, shelter, and water) when not
obtained through reuse and recycling, should be produced and distributed in the
most sustainable way. But we also know that when we produce other less
necessary "green" products -- more energy efficient light bulbs, refrigerators,
or cars -- we tend to just utilize more of the products themselves and rarely
gain a net decrease in energy or materials consumption. Industrial production is
clearly a source of unspeakable consumption and environmental degradation due
to pollution and toxic waste. Increases in production and consumption of any
kind are simply incompatible with environmental or biological sustainability. Sustainability
requires jobs that maintain "needs" rather than jobs that produce "wants."

Due to global capitalism, most of us do not have access to
the means of production of our basic needs. We do not have land to grow food,
materials for clothing, or materials to build shelters. We do not have clean
water bodies of our own. We are wholly reliant on jobs to live.

Given these circumstances, how might we reduce production
and consumption and still enable a populace to survive when they are faced with
record high unemployment? One solution toward that end, one stop-gap measure on
the road to localization, corporate annihilation, and total sustainability, could
be a world-wide mandate for a living/livable wage.

I rarely feel a great deal of pride about my undergraduate
alma mater, Georgetown
University -- a place that
produced the likes of Bill Clinton, Pat Buchanan and Antonin Scalia. Six years
ago, however, I was bursting with admiration for twenty-two brave young students
there who staged a ten-day hunger strike to pressure the administration to
implement a living wage for campus workers. Many of the service workers at the
university could not come close to making a livable income to support their
basic needs in our nation's capitol, and these students took a bold stand in solidarity
with the workers.

As income stratification has grown and wages for the
majority of the population have stagnated, many people, if employed at all, find
themselves with jobs that do not provide enough money to actually pay their
bills. Thus, they are forced to take on second and third jobs -- all at
inadequate wages -- which leave them with little or no time for their families.

Unemployment is obviously untenable for families, but so too
is over-employment in low-paying jobs. And yet, as unions are being obliterated
and CEOs b*tch and moan their way to record obscene profits, the majority of
jobs being created are lower and lower wage.

Imagine if every job was a 40-hr-a-week position that paid a
living wage, a salary that enabled a person to cover her bills and live in a
modicum of comfort. Economists will tell you that if you implement a living
wage, the total number of jobs will decrease. That is precisely the idea. We do
not need more destructive, crappy jobs. With living wages, perhaps only one parent
would have to work rather than two. Perhaps the children could forgo working
and concentrate on their educations. Then, more jobs would not be necessary
because more people would not need to work. Some of the unemployed might be
able to be categorized as non-employed and not needing to look. Others of the
unemployed could take on the second and third jobs vacated by workers who no
longer need them. We would not have to create more jobs; we could get by with
fewer. (And that is the point, because fewer jobs mean less ecological
destruction.) Additionally, governments would not have to expend as much on
programs such as welfare and food stamps, which only have to exist because of
insufficient corporate wages and greed at the upper echelons of society.

Sure, CEOs would complain that they could not afford to pay
a livable wage, but we know that is an utter lie. Perhaps they might have to
learn to cut from the top rather than from the bottom. Maybe they'd have to
learn to live without those gold-plated bathroom fixtures, that extra corporate
jet, or those thousands-dollar red-bottomed stilettos for a month or two. We
know that their salaries alone could be slashed in half and used to pay their
employees, and they would still be multimillionaires. We can no longer allow the lies of the elite
class to be taken for granted and perpetuated unchallenged.

Kristine Mattis received her PhD from the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. As an interdisciplinary environmental scholar with a background in Biology and Earth System Science, her research focuses (more...)